Singer/songwriter Mac Davis moved to Georgia from Texas and graduated from South Dekalb High School, where he organized his first band. For 7 years Davis worked as a regional representative for both Vee Jay and Liberty Records. In 1967 Liberty moved him to Los Angeles to head that company's music publishing arm. Davis continued to write songs that were recorded by a number of artists, but never became hits. In 1968 his career got a huge boost when Elvis Presley scored a #1 hit with In The Ghetto, for which Mac Davis wrote both the music and the lyrics.

Other Presley recordings penned by Davis include Don't Cry Daddy and Memories. With the success of In the Ghetto Mac Davis became a popular songwriter with such standards as Something's Burning (Kenny Rodgers and the First Edition), Watching Scotty Grow (Bobby Goldsboro) and I Believe in Music (Gallery). It was this last hit that became Davis's signature song.

In 1972, at the behest of a CBS Records executive, Davis recorded Baby Don't Get Hooked On Me, which he followed up with a moderate string of hits in both the pop and country charts including Stop And Smell The Roses, It's Hard To Be Humble, and Texas In My Rear View Mirror. For two years he hosted and performed on a self-titled music variety show on NBC and acted in North Dallas Forty (1979), Cheaper To Keep Her (1980), and 1983's forgettable The Sting II. After taking some time off in the mid-1980's he returned to a variety of roles as both songwriter and actor.